Desk modules where a screen skewed around a horizontal axis is placed in line of sight between a persons face and a display, and where the image of the face reflected by the screen is picked up by a camera placed above or below the screen is known in prior art.
US2004/0165060 (McNelley et al.) rejects this line-up principle and argues that increased bulk of the terminal is a drawback, that the addition of a transparent barrier in front of the display will affect viewing of the display surface, that the appearance of the display is recessed far into the terminal creating a tunnel effect and, lastly, that “the awkward positioning of the camera” will intrudes into the conferee's work space. Instead McNelley et al. discloses camera in a room environment, positioned behind a beam-splitter to capture the conferee's image through the beam-splitter. The beam-splitter is used for capturing images from one direction, and for allowing the conferee to see the environment through the beam-splitter. The document suggests the option to create the appearance of an image of a remote conferee and the local conferee in the same local environment on each side of a desk. In effect, the beam-splitter does not transmit anything beyond the top of a remote conferee.
The camera is positioned behind the viewing side of the beam-splitter to capture the conferee's image through the beam-splitter. The some 150 various embodiments of the terminal are illustrated in an equal amount of figures. Common for all the illustrated terminals is that in practice, they allow for transmission of the image of a conferee's face only. FIG. 60 illustrates three conferees' heads crowding up in line, watching an image of three lined up heads shrunk to fit the display, a set-up with obvious drawbacks. McNelley therefore suggests an alternative way to accommodate multiple users; a set of terminals are essentially coupled in parallel, i.e. multiple cameras, or a single camera is mounted on a turntable. Computers are used to attempt to emulate eye-to-eye contact. These embodiments require the use of image blocking film to prevent the conferees from seeing the display directly. The film reduces the image intensity. The end-user experience is that of dispersed obscure ghostlike talking heads, not to mention the time-sharing problem associated with the turntable solution.
US2005/0237381 A1, McDuffie, discloses a device in which a backdrop surface is superimposed upon the image of the remote person, as a way to mitigate the ghostlike appearance.
In U.S. Pat. No. 6,882,358 Schuster et al., identifies a problem as follows: “the video images of the conference participants make it appear as if the participants are gazing off into space, rather than looking directly at each other. Thus, although the participants may see each other at times, they cannot achieve eye-to-eye contact. This problem is exacerbated by today's larger video monitors and projection screens, since this forces the angle between the camera direction and the conference participants' focal direction to be increased. This lack of eye contact is a significant drawback, which limits the usefulness of today's video conferencing equipment in providing a natural conversation. Furthermore, without eye-to-eye contact, the trustworthiness of meeting participants is difficult to judge.” Schuster proposes a solution that relies on the premise of physically or virtually locating the camera such that its field of view (FOV) originates behind the display and passes through the central portion of the video display. The conference participants are presumed to look toward the center of the display, in which case their eyes will be directed toward the physical or virtual camera location, rather than away from it, thus enabling a feel of eye-to-eye contact between the participants. Unfortunately, this has an unwanted and highly detrimental side effect of creating a false eye contact impression. If one participant has “eye-contact” with a person on the other side, then by definition all participants have “eye-contact” with that same person.
WO 2008/036931 McDuffie discloses a desk module with backdrop similar to desk modules disclosed in US2005/0237381 A1, McDuffie, U.S. Pat. No. 6,882,358 Schuster and US2004/0165060 McNelley. WO 2009/120814 discloses an alternative desk module setup and a FIG. 1a, in which a participant to the extreme left or right is obviously not gazing directly toward any comprised camera 110C when looking at the respective screen 120L or 120R closest to the participant. Therefore, clearly, neither true nor false “eye-contact” may be obtained through this system. Neither of the documents discloses a communication system for communication between two studios of the same type.
Eye contact is a considerable component of the non-verbal communication in a common dialogue. If the implicit rules are not conformed to irritation occurs.
Therefore it is highly detrimental to the quality of a meeting when true eye contact cannot be reproduced in a video conversation. And even more so as gestures and body language is not transmitted at all. For instance the disregarded but absolutely vital process of taking turns during a conversation or a negotiation requires that all participants have access to accurate eye movement and full body language of all the other participants.
Existing technology does not deliver this, and under such circumstances people feel cheated, and as a result they become frustrated. (Hutchby, I. (2001) Conversation and Technology: From the Telephone to the Internet (Cambridge: Polity). Frustrated meeting participants is a definite showstopper for any high end conference tool.
Therefore executive officers, members of the diplomatic corps etc. still travel long distances to participate in different kinds of meetings, despite physical inconvenience, carbon dioxide emissions, security issues such as volcano eruptions and terrorism, and high cost. It is just not humanly possible to perform sensitive negotiations without full access to eye contact and body language. This is a need that obviously has not been met, despite assiduous attempts.